Chisel of Remembrance

by Vera Schwarcz

Chisel of Remembrance is devoted to the premise that in the cultural and communal traditions of all peoples, be they Chinese, Jewish or Tibetean, there is what Yeats called a ceremony of innocence offering salvation from the mere anarchy loosed when the past is forgotten. In poems concerning the classical arts of creation, the value of remembrance, the havoc wrought by war and revolution, and the peace gained by ancient practices of meditation and devotion to the present, the author urges us to hear the voice within the silence. Reviewers have praised the exciting combination of passion, wisdom, and historical perspective present in this new poetry collection by Vera Schwarcz. Stanley Moss finds the work of Schwarcz to be "poetry of a very high order, simultaneously informed by English, Chinese, Hungarian, Romanian, German, Hebrew, and Jewish religious tradition. I place English first only because the book is written in English. But I hear Chinese, a language I do not know, as dominant while post-Holocaust emotion is ever-present... This politically charged poetry with its abhorrence of suffering also teaches a profound love of nature, while providing the simple pleasures Auden required."

76 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2009

About the author

Vera Schwarcz (born 1947) (Chinese name: Chinese: 舒衡哲)is Freeman Professor of East Asian Studies at Wesleyan University. Her BA was from Vassar College, with a MA from Yale, where she studied with Jonathan Spence, a MAA from Wesleyan University and a Ph.D. from Stanford University. From 1979 to 1980, she studied at Peking University as part the first group of American students admitted after the establishment of diplomatic relations between the U.S. and China. In addition to works of history, Schwarcz writes poetry and novellas.

(from Wikipedia)